Identifying and Advocating Best Practices in the Criminal Justice System. A Texas-Centric Examination of Current Conditions, Reform Initiatives, and Emerging Issues with a Special Emphasis on Capital Punishment.

Tuesday, 05 February 2013

Death Penalty Risky, Too Expensive

A coalition of Democrats and Republicans raised the issue of the death penalty again in the Montana Legislature.

These
activists contend there are a variety of reasons to oppose the death
penalty, including the high cost of litigating death penalty cases and
the extended period, sometimes decades, it takes for those cases to be
settled.

Morality
is another reason. Some consider the death penalty immoral or
hypocritical because it calls for the state to kill someone, usually
after the person who was convicted committed murder himself.

Others,
who consider themselves pro-life when it comes to abortion, have
acknowledged a contradiction when they also supported a death penalty
for killers.

Back
in September, we stated our opposition to the death penalty and we will
restate it here as the Legislature considers whether to tackle this
issue again.

A
bill was introduced Monday, and its primary sponsor was Rep. Doug Kary,
R-Billings. Sen. Dave Wanzenried, D-Missoula, requested that the bill be
drafted.

More information on House Bill 370 is available from the Montana Legislative website.

Four
Montana legislators spearheading a bipartisan effort to replace the
death penalty with life in prison say they have a good chance of success
this session.

The anti-death penalty group Montana Abolition Coalition introduced their proposal Monday with two Democratic and two Republican sponsors.

Efforts
to repeal the death penalty have cleared the state Senate the last two
legislative sessions but died in the House. Backers said they are going
to start in the House this time in an effort to get the measure to a
floor debate in that chamber.

And:

"We've all come to the conclusion that the death penalty has failed in Montana," said Rep. Doug Kary, R-Billings. "The system we have has failed us. And the conclusion is the death penalty must go."

State Sen. Dave Wanzenried,
a Missoula Democrat and veteran of past legislative fights over the
death penalty, said he does not know of a case where Montana wrongly
executed an innocent man — but it could happen.

"Do we want to keep at this until me make sure we execute someone who is innocent?" he said.

"We realize that the death penalty simply doesn't work and it's time for Montana to stop. To stop wasting our precious resources on this. Every state cost study has found that the death penalty costs run into the millions and accomplish nothing," said MT State Representative Doug Kary (R-Billings), who will sponsor the bill.

"Executions create many victims. Not only the family members of the person who is executed, but the people we ask to carry out the machinery of death in our name and that's our employees in our Montana correctional system," said Representative Margie MacDonald (D-Billings), another advocate.

Republican Representative Doug Kary says that he will carry the bill
this session with hopes of receiving support from both house and senate.

Death
penalty opponents argue the punishment is immoral and that it is costly
to the state. Efforts to repeal the death penalty have cleared the
state senate the last two legislative sessions but died in the house.

Two Democratic and 2 Republican legislators introduced House Bill 370
today. Under the proposed measure, a prisoner would never become
eligible for parole and could never be released from prison. Democratic
Senator Dave Wanzenreid says it's time to end capital punishment in
Montana.

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The StandDown Texas Project

The StandDown Texas Project was organized in 2000 to advocate a moratorium on executions and a state-sponsored review of Texas' application of the death penalty.
To stand down is to go off duty temporarily, especially to review safety procedures.

Steve Hall

Project Director Steve Hall was chief of staff to the Attorney General of Texas from 1983-1991; he was an administrator of the Texas Resource Center from 1993-1995. He has worked for the U.S. Congress and several Texas legislators. Hall is a former journalist.